The Eagle and the Horse
by ZealousPhoenix245
Summary: "He was an eagle, and she was the horse. But no matter how far she ran, he would always fly faster and catch her. After all, the predator was faster than the prey...though, then raised the question of just who was who in their impromptu little game..." Interconnected semi-drabble series based heavily on the first branch of the Celtic "Four Branches of the Mabinogi" myth. Altair/OC
1. Bell in the Night

**Quick Author's Note**: Okay, okay, okay. "You should've updated 'Honor Bound'!" I know. Stone me. I don't care. I got the Assassin's Creed series for Christmas and have been utterly obsessed all over again since. So, if you wish to blame someone, blame my father. He got them for me and started the craze. I plead no part in this insanity...

Anyway, this, if you couldn't tell, will be a sort-of-but-not-quite interconnected drabble series to get my random AC ideas out of my head in an attempt to keep my main story ideas purely centered around updating and revising my previously mentioned Elder Scrolls fic. Give me some slack, though, I have midterms this week. One class I'm dangerously close to getting a B in if I flunk the test (I have all A's right now, and would like to keep it before you go wondering what's so bad about a B) so I'm nervous as hell. Add in that I'm posting this at 2 in the morning, and voila.

Anyway, as some of you may have also noticed, I'm basing this off of the Celtic "Four Branches of the Mabinogi" myth, the first branch in particular that has to do with the horse goddess/queen Rhiannon (lots of background as to why Rhiannon is never outright stated as a goddess that's actually quite interesting but I'm not going to get into at 2 in the freaking morning). And, also, yes, my name is Rhiannon. No, this isn't a self-insert fic. I'm one of those strange people who actually _like_ my name. When I like a name, I tend to want to use it. I like the myth, too, and have wanted to write something off of it for years. My name, obviously, creates kind of a weird image if I use it for a character, so I've refrained. But, by my mother's ashes, I'm going to do it! *insert lame self-confidence speech here*

I also took some creative inspiration from the Fleetwood Mac song "Rhiannon" and will quote it in chapters where I used it. I also apologize for any historical or linguistic information that is off. I'm not an expert, and the internet isn't the greatest source of information, I'll admit. So if you pick up on anything other than the fact that Prince Dafydd didn't actually have a daughter named Rhiannon, please kindly take the time and inform me. It would be greatly appreciated so I can keep it as accurate as humanly possible.

So, I'll leave you with a disclaimer...

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Assassin's Creed. All rights go to their respective owners. All I own are copies of the games and a book of Celtic myths...

* * *

"Rhiannon rings like a bell through the night, and  
wouldn't you love to love her?  
She rules her life like a bird in flight, and  
who will be her lover?"

~"Rhiannon" by Fleetwood Mac, live performance in Burbank, California on May 23rd, 1997 (oddly enough, six days before I was born...)

* * *

"Wait!" Even as the word escaped his throat, Altair Ibn-La'ahad cursed it. His hand was outstretched as he landed on the ledge of a roof, balancing precariously on instinct. On a sloping Acre rooftop just a small leap away, emerald eyes smirked tauntingly before movement began again with a flurry of scarlet hair. Gritting his teeth in irritation, the Eagle of Masyaf found himself leaping after the green cloaked and insufferably frustrating individual before his conscious mind could rethink his actions. Annoyed as he was, however, and as much as he desired to run his hidden blade across the fragile neck of his target just to rid himself of the trouble, there was a small damnable voice in the back of his mind reminding him that he _enjoyed_ the little impromptu chase. Much like the bird of prey for which he was named, Altair relished in the thrill of a hunt. Perhaps, he'd wondered, that was what made him as good of an Assassin as he was. For what good was a killer if they didn't at least welcome some aspect of the chase?

And that was what Altair thoroughly knew he was doing. The adrenaline coursing through his veins was exhilarating. The air ruffling the white assassin's robes and the inescapable clinking sounds his weapons made with the movement was more than friendly music to his ears. For the hazel-eyed man, it was his life. It was all he knew. Though, lately, he was beginning to wonder.

It had started with his first of the nine assassinations of which Al Mualim had ordered. Nine lives for his own – Altair would be lying if he claimed there wasn't some part of him that was graciously relieved. Grudgingly, he had accepted that breaking the Creed had been a mistake. A dire one that he had though he would've paid with his life. His arrogance had been a double-edged sword, if he was honest. It had helped him rise in the ranks of the Brotherhood quickly and earn the master's favor. Altair took risks not many others would, and had been lucky enough to come out of everything with his neck intact. Because of this, Al Mualim thankfully thought him too important, too vital, to the Brotherhood and spared his life. He regretted the death of Kadar and Malik's lost status which accompanied his severed arm, but the past was not something that could be changed. Only learned from.

Tamir was an easy enough kill, and Damascus guards were considerably thick-headed. On the way to the desert city from Masyaf, Altair had concluded this rather quickly. His thoughts had been cut short when he'd caught sight of another horse cantering in his direction. Altair had quickly stooped himself over on his white Arabian stallion in case the other rider happened to be a guard or other threat. Checking his Eagle Vision, the assassin had gotten quite the shock.

The rider wasn't red, blue, gold, or even the subtle tone of white.

No, this woman, as was evident as she got closer, was _colorless_.

He'd watched, distracted by the strange lack of an aura, as the head of long, fire-glinting hair turned to grin at him over her shoulder. A dress of a strange make glowed golden in the sunlight, flowing sleeves and skirt drifting along with the pure white, and notably _not_ Arabian, stallion's canter. The look in her green eyes, barely shrouded by the white cowl delicately placed over her hair and close enough for Altair to scarcely make them out, dared him to chase her.

So he had.

It was to no avail, though, if he remembered correctly. As he spurred his horse faster, it was as if by magic she got farther and farther away. Her pace never quickened, nor did it slow. Eventually, Altair had to stop his chase as his horse was at its wits end, but he watched the strange woman send one final coy look over her shoulder before disappearing into the waves of desert heat.

Confused, he'd asked the Rafiq about if a strange woman had been spotted in the desert near Damascus. The only response the assassin had gotten was a boisterous laugh and an offhand comment that he needed to pace himself when traipsing across the barren, heat-ridden planes. Altair had been thoroughly annoyed, but after realizing that he was going to get no other answers other than the heat had finally driven him insane, he'd given in and gone about his required information-gathering and the assassination that so inevitably followed. Death really did seem to track assassins wherever they went, he'd noted dully, be it safety or danger.

The next three assassinations and their cryptic messages had left him not nearly the proper amount of time to think of the strange woman, and he had begun to somewhat believe the Rafiq that she really had been a trick of the desert, a mirage. A strange mirage, but a hallucination derived from the dire Syrian heat, nonetheless.

At least, until he'd seen her again at Abu'l Nuqoud's party.

She'd been standing behind the Merchant King of Damascus. For once, he didn't notice his target first, but he wondered deftly how anyone couldn't have noticed her before all else. She screamed of European descent where everyone around her was not. Her clothing was flowing, simpler while still being elaborate and colored a rich purple akin to Abu'l's own. Sleeves hid the hands delicately clasped in front of her, if not tensely, and her hair had cascaded around her bowed head in ringlets. By her posture, Altair had been instantly able to tell that she wished to be anywhere but standing behind the hideously overweight man giving vivacious speeches to the gathered crowd. Emerald eyes had locked with his after a moment, but instead of daring him to give chase, they had pleaded. What they had said exactly, he couldn't be sure, but his suspicions pinned it as asking for him to get her away from the balcony.

He still didn't know why he had taken pity on the girl (she had, after all, made him think he was going crazy), but he'd complied. She'd been ushered inside when the guests had started reacting to the poisoned wine, and he caught her glance from behind a curtained window when he'd driven his hidden blade into the neck of the Merchant King. _Thank you_ was the unsaid statement, gratitude. Wryly, Altair had noted that it wasn't a reaction he often got for his assassinations.

So, naturally, in a reckless move, he'd stopped by that same balcony a day later on his way out of the city. As he'd expected and not knowing what it was he had wanted to find, no life littered the courtyard, and the deceased Merchant King's palace was locked up tight. However, one thing had caught his hazel eye as he'd leaped on the railing to take off into the night on his way to Acre.

A note.

Only four words adorned the scrap of papyrus, two in flowing English that took him a few moments to decipher as "_Thank you_", and two more, "_fy arwr_", a language that Altair had never seen before. Even without confirmation, the euphemized assassin couldn't help but just _know_ it was from the strangely dressed woman who had so carelessly taunted him.

Why he kept the note, Altair didn't know. Perhaps it was out of desperation to prove that he hadn't been hallucinating when he'd seen her, perhaps it was out of the damnable curiosity that the woman had sparked – to be blunt, he really didn't care. Regardless of the reason, he didn't stop cursing himself even as his blade ended the life of William of Montferrat.

While outrunning the guards, he'd caught sight of her again. The woman had pulled him into a slim alley, actually (not that he'd admit she'd saved his hide – benches or haystacks seemed to be quite the rarity right when he needed them most). After the coast was clear and the guards had gone about searching for the white-robed assassin elsewhere in the grand city of Acre, Altair had been expecting quite ominously to get some answers from the woman now clad in another one of her strangely styled green dresses with a green cloak to protect against the settling evening chill. Instead, she'd flashed another sly grin and leaned up to breath in his ear, her voice carrying a strange lilt that only accented the bell-like qualities hidden within the whisper.

"Catch me if you can, _fy arwr_," he glared at her when the foreign words, but only received the single, chiming laugh of a versed songbird from the depths of emerald eyes before she was gone, sprinting down to the opposite end of the alley and vanishing around the corner. A game, he'd realized quickly when he'd begun to give chase. Cat-and-mouse, essentially, but it didn't lose any bit of the thrill he gained from tracking his targets. Only, the more he chased the strange woman across Acre, darting past guards and offing a few of the ones unlucky enough to get in his way (and he didn't miss how his target seemed to evade all of them without issue or blood), the less and less he thought about the red-head as a target to _kill_. Merely, he noted, she became one to catch and keep. The thought frightened him, deeply, but he couldn't find himself able to let it go. After all, it wasn't as if it was an emotional attachment. Simply curiosity drove him, and he was going to get answers. Even if he had to _swim_ after her.

The thought of the large body of water and actually having to try and keep himself afloat made him shudder. Then again, such extremes may not be worth it…

Hence how he found himself, in the middle of the night with the alarm bells still ringing across the city, jumping rooftop to rooftop after a foreign woman he'd only seen twice before, but not with the intent of blood. _That_ was how he found himself standing across from her, on opposite sides of a rooftop, staring off. Her breathing was impressively minutely labored, eyes focused on him curiously with a hint of self-satisfaction. Her disheveled and wind-blown scarlet locks had been swept out of their already loose ringlets and looked a darker shade of red in the moonlight gleaming down from above. It quickly became a staring contest between emerald and hazel, each daring the other to back off but neither willing to comply.

She spoke first, "If you wanted me to wait, it would have been more beneficial to you all this time to simply ask me as you just did, _eryr_. It would've been a kinder fate to befall that poor stallion you drove to exhaustion." The amusement lacing her bird-like voice was palpable in the chiming that resounded so aptly in-tune with the still echoing warning bells. Still, Altair irritatingly couldn't place her decidedly exotic word or the accent that accompanied it. And once more did his face twist further into irritation at the thought of his steed and the state he had urged the thing to in trying to reach the strangely garbed enigma. Her words were, unfortunately, true. Once more he'd made a fool out of himself, he supposed.

"You're playing a dangerous game, woman," he warned tightly. "You'd do well to stop." For good measure, he urged his left hand up just a tad, ready to spring the blade hidden in its bracer. To his dismay, the woman remained unfazed. Not that he was shocked. She didn't seem like the type to take threats to her life nearly as seriously as she probably should have.

A tongue clicked at him, "A shame. I find the thrill of the risks and the danger of their outcome outweighs quitting while so tauntingly close to the prize by quite the far cry." By now she'd crossed her arms and was shaking her head languidly at him in a condescending manner which made Altair more than furious. She was taunting him again. In fact, the Eagle of Masyaf could see temptation in every one of the barest moves the woman made. Yes, this mystery loved being chased and expertly lured prey of her own into doing just that. She relished in being the hunted as much as the hunter enjoyed his spot initiating the chase. Only, this time, it was the sly fox who had taunted the assassin into pursuit and not the other way around.

Clever she had to be, he thought, if he hadn't noticed that little fact until just then.

"First I see you on the road to Damascus," Altair growled, "then in the city at the Merchant King's party, and now here in Acre. I'm finding it too much to be a coincidence. Are you following me?"

She laughed, but this time, it was loud and clear as the bells tolling their last, "No, no! It appears the Morrigan has had say in our encounters. The reasons I was in Damascus, or even this wretched 'Holy Land' of yours, in the first place is difficult, but I assure you, it was nothing of harm to you or yours."

Altair's tenseness relaxed a margin at the reassurance, but not enough to be off his guard, "You were in Damas for the party, then? Seems to be quite the ways from what you have implied." His impromptu companion bit her lip in a brief moment of silent contemplation of her words.

"No," she replied finally, "not for the party specifically. I was there for a ceremony, by order of my father. You're the man who killed Abu'l, aren't you?"

Altair answered tersely, "Yes."

Instead of cowering away like he'd expected or turning harsh, she gave a dazzling grin and stepped closer to him, "Then you are in my debt, for saving me from a fate I had pushed upon me against my will. You see, I was in Damascus to marry Abu'l Nuqoud, the Merchant King. My father arranged the union a year back, misinterpreting Abu'l's power in the area in favor of his riches. I did not want to become that…_thing_'_s_ wife, but I allowed it for a time. When you killed him, you saved me from a life of docile servitude that I did not desire. Thank you." At this, the assassin could only blink, eying the woman who was his prior target's wife. It wasn't every day he had people thanking him for killing someone, and he couldn't lie and say that he was expecting the day to come when the _spouse_ of one of his targets did so with such sincerity. But, she still left one question precariously unanswered:

"That doesn't explain your presence in Acre."

Again to his irritation, she laughed, "It is a port city, is it not? In my _grief_ my dearest father wished me back home in Gwrinydd. The only way back to Wales is by boat, I'm afraid." Wales? If Altair could remember correctly from the one time as a child it had been told to him, it was a country rather far into Europe. And it explained that the strange language she spoke was most likely Welsh…

So, he decided to ask another question, "Who are you?" A grin and a curtsy followed his inquiry, and he quirked a brow at the action before very quickly being dumbfounded.

"My name is Princess Rhiannon of the Kingdom of Gwrinydd, daughter of Prince Dafydd, son of Owain, and Lady Emme of Anjou. It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance…hmm…it appears I do not know my savior's name. What a shame," as soon as the words left the noblewoman's lips, Altair couldn't help but smack himself for not realizing it sooner. Her skin was pale and flawless, her hair deliberately long and well-cared for, and her dresses were made of fine silks. She bore the marks of nobility if Altair had ever seen them, minus the stamina to leap and climb across buildings and give a master (at least in ability) assassin a run for his money.

"My lady," he quipped, allowing the sarcasm. She was nobility, he understood, but not nobility of his country. And even so, the only person he obeyed without question was Al Mualim and those the Master told him to follow. "If I give you my name, I'll have to kill you."

She eyed him knowingly, stepping closer until they were a foot apart. As Rhiannon was a head shorter than himself, she had to crane her neck to lock emerald eyes with his own, but the action had the desired effect. Altair stared back willingly, peering into the soul that lay beyond the façade. The red-haired enigma was intrigued, he noted, intrigued and somewhat broken of her will. Little did the Eagle know at the time, but upon seeing the fractures, he had made a vow. The first Creed running freshly through his mind, to never hurt an innocent, made him deeply desire to teach the one who had harmed this innocent Welsh woman before him the same lesson he himself had been taught, sans the redemption. He found he could not forgive the emotional tolls (though unknowledgeable of their extent) placed upon the mystery songbird who had so strangely walked into his assassin life.

In the midst of his thoughts, Rhiannon had taken his silence as seriousness, and her face fell slightly, "I see, then. I'll leave you. Forgive me for bothering you with my questions, _fy arwr_." Hazel eyes tracked her away from him to the edge of the rooftop where she had been previously. His mind followed her movements closely as she leaped on the rim of what Altair was sure to be one of the only honest to goodness flat rooftops in Acre. Rhiannon glanced back at him, eyes having lost that luster of vivaciousness they'd once held only scant moments beforehand. A luster he found himself so desperately wanting to restore despite his better judgment. A gust of wind blew, seeming to harden his resolve and make him speak out despite his mind screaming at him to turn and run back to the bureau.

"Altair."

Her breath caught, and the light re-entered the emeralds. A beaming smile was his response as she leaped away.

But the assassin in white couldn't help but just _know_ it wouldn't be the last he'd seen of the Welsh Princess.

And he found himself severely hoping it wasn't as he, too, took off into the night.

* * *

Final Words: Well, I hope it wasn't too rushed. I'm tired, give me a break.

Now, off to my nice, warm bed...but first...translations! I used google translate, so they're probably not accurate, but, meh.

Welsh: "_fy_ arwr"  
English: "My hero" (sappy, I know)

Welsh: "_eryr_"  
English: "_eagle_"

Well, R&R!  
~ZealousPhoenix


	2. Any Other Way

**The Eagle and the** **Horse**

By: ZealousPhoenix245

Quick Author's Note: Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's short. It's drabble. Get over it. I recently decided that I'd let my copy of ACII sit on the shelf wrapped long enough and finally started playing it and totally fell in love with renaissance Italy. It may have something to do with my Italian roots and the fact that I love the renaissance time period (or just that you get to see Machiavelli and Leonardo da Vinci who're, like, two of my historical idols for unfathomable reasons), but nonetheless, I'm hooked. Altair is still my favorite, but Ezio's pretty badass. :)

Anyway, here it is! My ridiculously short next installment! Apologies!

* * *

"Get me out of this god forsaken city  
Let me start over somewhere new  
All my friends have turned up missing  
I can't blame it on my youth  
Throw my heart in the well of wishing  
Pay my toll to just move on.  
Ask myself to please forgive me  
All my innocence is gone."

~"Backfire" by Egypt Central (I command you to look up this band - they may have disbanded, but they're breathtakingly amazing)

* * *

"Why do you chase me, Eryr?" the woman asked suddenly. Somewhat startled by her question, Altair glanced down at her from where she leaned her head against the boulder beside their makeshift campsite. The desert sun had long since set, casting the Holy Land in shadows, and Rhiannon reflected the loss of heat by wrapping herself in the confines of what Altair had learned to be her favorite green cloak. The Welsh noblewoman's red curls were dusty from the sand drifting about them during their trek from Acre, but her emerald eyes hadn't lost any of their inquisitive luster. If anything, they gained some curiosity as they continued to stare straight ahead towards the purple horizon.

Altair shrugged, "Why does a predator chase its prey?" Her sharp eyes flickered to him, trying to seem angry but failing when the glint of amusement ceased to be inconspicuous.

"Are you saying I'm your prey?"

"Perhaps," he smirked in response.

Rhiannon laughed, a mirthful sound that didn't fail to resonate like quiet bells, "Well, I don't know whether to be frightened or amused by that statement." There was teasing on her tone, sure, but it didn't hide the glee woven in the tenor of her voice from having finally escaped from her prison. Acre, the dusty city of mostly European settlement that had housed her with a vengeance only disguised by hospitality was in her past now. Masyaf held her future. A future she looked forward to with a smile on her face and her Eagle by her side. Altair had promised to help free the Horse of her chains, and he had followed through. Though she knew of his profession as an Assassin, she deftly realized that had it not been for that ghastly job, she would still have been married off to Abu'l, or possibly still trapped in Whales with another potential suitor at her side instead of the tall Syrian man there now. As a result, she couldn't have cared less that about all he knew in life was killing.

Fate, she decided, was quite the funny thing.

She tore her gaze away from the horizon and to the small fire, reduced to such a size in an attempt to evade any bandits or patrolling guards that Altair may have missed. In truth, though her father and mother had given her more autonomy than was considered proper for a young lady of a royal court, Rhiannon decidedly had never felt freer than she did in that moment, out in the desert with not another soul in sight save for the only person she really wished to be there. There was no mother to jump out and scold her in broken Welsh at the slightest mannerism unsatisfactorily attempted, and there was no father continually pushing her to surpass her brothers in their studies in hopes that, if all else failed and her male siblings tried to follow in their father's footsteps and stage a coup, there would still be a loyal child to recover the lost lands, female or no. No more pressures. No more feeling like darkness was encroaching upon her very being in the form of suitors and over-expecting parents.

There was just her, Altair, the desert, and prospects of a brighter future.

And she wouldn't have had it any other way.

* * *

Final words: Yeah, sorry this one is short, but I did originally intend for this to be a random drabble series. I've been going through some ups and downs lately, mainly some semi-unexpected turns of familial events that are keeping me on my toes, so to speak. Also, my dad went against my will and enrolled me in a driver's training course. I'm about ready to pull my hair out after one class (I mean, it's like these idiots can't fathom that someone can get a perfect score on the quiz when they didn't take notes the entirety of the class - ever heard of a little thing called a _memory_?). Gah.

Anyway, you know the drill. R&R!  
~ZealousPhoenix


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